Category: Life
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Underappreciated and overwhelmed
I woke up to the sounds of Amma bustling in the kitchen. The dishwasher was being unloaded, the microwave humming and the cooker hissing in the background. Stretching lazily, I also heard sounds of one of the twins waking. Ignoring any temptation to snooze for a few more minutes, I jumped out of bed to…
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Q&A: R2I or not?
Anonymouse asked: Have you all decided to live here in USA for the rest of your life and do you ever think about going back to India? Well! like every desi (almost) I have met here in the US, I have thought and still think about this. In the first few years here, the answer…
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Nine and counting
You stand by the doorway one hand on the door, shooting lingering glances at our daughters. You bend down one more time to kiss them good-bye before you leave for work. I watch as you reluctantly close the door behind you giving me a quick nod as you go down the stairs. I hear the…
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Doing away with the rose tints
10:30 PM – Call it a day 11:30 PM – Sounds of Cee crying. Wonder if I should let her cry it out. 11:35 PM – Pick Cee up from her crib and bring her back to my room. 11:45 PM – Cee looks sleepy and ready to go back. Kay wakes up crying 11:47…
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Strange! This life of mine.
Walking into the store with Kay perched on my hips and my mom following with Cee clinging to her, I looked around for a cart and effortlessly wiped down the cart handle and the seating area for the kids before plonking them down and strapping the seat belts in. Pushing the twins in a cart, the…
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Ok, Can we stop the BS?
Seated across the sales person at a car dealership, K and I were getting increasingly impatient. It was two hours since we got there and the salesman was pulling every trick in the book to keep us from the number we were asking. Every ten minutes he would fake a conversation with his manager only…
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Letters from a daughter to her father
Dear Appa, I woke up this morning to the sight of two mottai kutties facing each other across from their cribs and having an animated conversation about who-knows-what. As I plonked them down for their morning feed, Amma held two bottles feeding both kids while I made myself a cup of strong filter coffee. Thoughts of you assailed my…
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Feeling good so no feel good?
Yesterday was one of those rare days when K and I got some uninterrupted TV time after the kids were asleep. Flipping channels, we landed on one of those sappy feel good movies on Hallmark. The movie started promisingly enough and the picturization of rural Mexico was enough to keep us glued. As the movie progressed…
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Renewal
Sounds of a cartoon playing in the next room drone at the back of my head occasionally punctuated by the squeals of Kay and Cee. I smile to myself, shake my head and resume working on whatever I was doing when my mind registered these sounds. Lifting my head, fresh green shoots catch my eye from…
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Moving from the outside to the inside
“Happy First Mother’s day!” said a couple of messages on Face.book. A link to a customized video in my inbox and two round cherubic bald faces wished me first thing this morning. I have had so many thoughts run through my head in the run up to today. While I struggled to express what I felt…